Welcome to my Astro-Man archive

This site is meant to be a visual archive of every variation of every Man... or Astro-Man? 7" single ever released. Most of what you'll see here comes from my personal collection. As information pours in I will post it, so please comment if you think you have something to add. I have no intention of posting MP3s here. I'm sure you can find the music elsewhere. This is just an attempt to collect information about the band's prolific creation of singles into one spot. If you can get past the fact that I rarely clean my scanner, I think you'll enjoy what you find here.

Use the Table of Contents on the sidebar if you are looking for details on a specific 7".

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Astro-Man Show Flyers

I've heard of people that don't care for the music Man... or Astro-Man? plays, but I've never heard of someone going to see them live and not being completely converted to their awesomeness. When I was younger I kept a scrapbook of show flyers for almost every band I went to see. As this blog is meant to be a dumping ground of sorts for all of my astro-baggage, I thought it would be the perfect place to post flyers from the times MOAM? played metro-Phoenix in the mid to late 1990s. Here goes:

This was the first time I saw the band. They played outside on the stage behind Boston's in Tempe, AZ. I had been home from a Mormon mission to France all of two days at this point, so this served as a sort of reintroduction to secular life for me. The Hale-Bopp comet was visible in the night sky behind the stage. Dexter X was the rhythm guitarist at this point. By the end of the show the sky had clouded over, and the Telsa coil looked especially menacing.

This show was later that same year, and was also at Boston's in Tempe. They shared the bill with the Delta 72. This one was indoors and I remember it being really packed. When the Tesla coil went off that night it knocked out power to the club for a few minutes. Boston's was pretty close to a local power sub-station, and for months afterward there were rumors that surrounding neighborhoods had issues with power surges. This flyer was a double-sided full page. It always bothered me that the ellipses (...) were in the wrong spot in the band name.

This was after the departure of Starcrunch and Dexter X, but before the next line-up was finalized. This was during the "Clone" phase of MOAM?'s history. The band that played in Tempe was the Clone Alpha band--the version made of men (the Clone Gamma band was an all female version of MOAM?). Coco was there as the merch guy, but he did not play with the band. This version had Richie Edelson as Cocoid and Erich Hubner as Chromo Crunch. The two would later join the band proper as Blazar the Probe Handler and Trace Reading. One of the opening bands, the Famous Monsters, featured the female bass player from White Zombie. As a result, half of the crowd came thinking it was a "secret" White Zombie show.

This was the fourth time I saw Astroman play at Boston's. The Rock*A*Teens were also on the bill, as was a local group called the Thundercats. The Thundercats featured two of the same guys from the Stamens, the opening band from my first MOAM? show. Years later I would play drums in a version the Thundercats that also featured Lance Kaufman on the organ. We would play a single show together. I remember missing Starcrunch at this point.

This was the last time I would see MOAM? in Arizona, and I'm fairly certain it was their final tour. It was a 21 or older show at Nita's Hideaway in Tempe. Mooney Suzuki were also on the bill. The show ended up happening in the lot behind the club and was sponsored by a beer company that rented a stage and fenced off the otherwise open parking lot. On this tour the band was selling the "Spectrum of Finite Scale" CD. They also had an Apple Imagewriter II printer that they brought out to "play" the song "A Simple Text File."

Bonus:My ticket and wristband from the Touch & Go 25 weekend in Chicago. This took place in September of 2006. MOAM? reformed with Starcrunch, Coco, Birdstuff and Dr. Deleto to play the event. I really went to see Astroman, but was also treated to performances by Ted Leo, Negative Approach, the Dijits, Big Black, Shellac, Girls Against Boys, Scratch Acid and dozens of other bands I can't currently remember. One hell of a weekend.

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About Me

I love soda pop, cheese, vinyl records, language, my friends and certain members of my family. I hate almost everything else. I currently teach high school and write a semi-regular food column for Salt Lake Underground Magazine. When I wait too long between haircuts, I start to look like a fat, myopic version of Art Garfunkel.